EL MUCHACHO CORRÍA HACIA LA PLAYA; molesto porque se quedó dormido y no pudo ir a cazar con el grupo; intentaba alcanzarlos antes de que partieran en las canoas, pero cuando llegó no halló ni las huellas porque las olas las habían borrado. Antes de acostarse había afilado su lanza, su padre le dijo que no pusiera el curare, que eso se hacía al momento de ver la presa; pero la emoción del chico no lo dejaba razonar y embadurnó la punta porque creía que el veneno se concentraría durante la noche.

     Ahora estaba frente al mar, mirando la lanza con nostalgia, con el vacío de la experiencia que hasta el momento no tenía y que anhelaba como todo guerrero de su tribu. Tenía doce años y deseaba ser como su padre y por orgullo no volvió a la choza, quiso quedarse allí, para esperar y reclamar a sus hermanos por qué no lo despertaron.

     Estaba el sol a media mitad del centro del cielo cuando el chico se quedó dormido. En su sueño, él estaba en la playa cuando lo sorprendieron tres canoas extrañas, inmensas y llenas de seres extraños, con armas extrañas y una forma de hablar muy distinta a la suya. En el mismo sueño, los hombres desembarcaron y se apoderaron de la comunidad; él había intentado detenerlos con su lanza embadurnada de curare, pero de un empujón lo derribaron. Esa noche los hombres extraños durmieron en la comunidad y el muchacho se quedó dormido en posición fetal; minutos después, soñaba dentro del sueño.

     En este segundo sueño, el chico es usado como guía a través de la selva, los extraños seres habían empezado a explorar el territorio y él los llevaba hacia las otras comunidades, a las que también sometieron, esclavizaron y mataron. En una de esas nuevas comunidades conquistadas decidieron pasar la noche y el chico comenzó a soñar dentro de este segundo sueño; en donde vio a pueblos destruidos, obligados a creer en dioses extraños, forzados a trabajar, a huir por la selva; así, al llegar la noche de cada sueño, el chico se dormía y reiniciaba la continuidad de aquel sueño que parecía nunca acabar, que se profundizaba y profundizaba las desgracias para los suyos.

     Eran sueños dentro de un sueño, que proyectaban los días venideros, que anunciaban la fatalidad para los nativos; sueños automáticos, uno detrás del otro que alargaban los días y que al parecer no tenían fin. Pero en uno de estos sueños, cuando ya se empezaban a construir nuevas ciudades, el chico no quiso dormirse, había decidido reinvertir los sueños, soñar en retroceso para ir despertando de cada uno y que todo volviera a la normalidad.

     Como en todo sueño, no tuvo claro algunos detalles, pero fue despertando de cada uno hasta que estuvo nuevamente frente al mar, con su lanza en la mano; esperando que llegaran los suyos con la cacería. Estaba sudando, en parte por el calor, en parte por el horrible sueño; su corazón era un marasmo de nervios, que se aceleró con el eco del disparo que llegó desde as casas.

     El chico corrió desesperado por la selva, sabía que aquella detonación era de un arma diferente, sabía que era un arma mortal porque lo había viviendo en su sueño, tuvo miedo de que le cambiaran a los dioses, de que le mataran a su gente, de que los pusieran de esclavos, tuvo miedo del sueño; y se lanzó a la selva con mayor determinación hasta que entró al pueblo, y fue peor porque su pesadilla había comenzado a hacerse realidad.

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The nightmare

THE BOY RUN TOWARD THE BEACH; upset because he fell asleep and could not go hunting with the group; he tried to reach them before they left in the canoes, but when he arrived he did not even find the tracks because the waves had erased them. Before going to bed he had sharpened his spear, his father told him not to put the curare, that that was done at the moment of seeing the prey; but the boy's emotion did not let him reason and he smeared the tip because he believed that the poison would concentrate during the night.

     Now he was in front of the sea, looking at the spear with nostalgia, with the emptiness of the experience he had not had so far and which he longed for like every warrior of his tribe. He was twelve years old and wished to be like his father and out of pride he did not return to the hut, he wanted to stay there, to wait and complain to his brothers why they did not wake him up.

     The sun was halfway to the center of the sky when the boy fell asleep. In his dream, he was on the beach when he was surprised by three strange canoes, huge and full of strange beings, with strange weapons and a way of speaking very different from his own. In the same dream, the men disembarked and took over the community; he had tried to stop them with his spear smeared with curare, but with a push they knocked him down. That night the strange men slept in the community and the boy fell asleep in the fetal position; minutes later, he was dreaming inside the dream.

      In this second dream, the boy is used as a guide through the jungle, the strange beings had begun to explore the territory and he led them to the other communities, which they also subdued, enslaved and killed. In one of those new conquered communities they decided to spend the night and the boy began to dream within this second dream; where he saw destroyed villages, forced to believe in strange gods, forced to work, to flee through the jungle; thus, when the night of each dream came, the boy fell asleep and restarted the continuity of that dream that seemed to never end, that deepened and deepened the misfortunes for his people.

     They were dreams within a dream, which projected the days to come, which announced doom for the natives; automatic dreams, one after the other, which lengthened the days and seemed to have no end. But in one of these dreams, when new cities were already being built, the boy did not want to fall asleep, he had decided to reinvert the dreams, to dream backwards in order to wake up from each one and for everything to return to normal.

     As in every dream, he was not clear about some details, but he was waking up from each one until he was again in front of the sea, with his spear in his hand; waiting for his people to arrive with the hunt. He was sweating, partly from the heat, partly from the horrible dream; his heart was a marasmus of nerves, which accelerated with the echo of the shot that came from the houses.

     The boy ran desperately through the jungle, he knew that that detonation was from a different weapon, he knew it was a deadly weapon because he had lived it in his dream, he was afraid that they would change the gods, that they would kill his people, that they would put them as slaves, he was afraid of the dream; and he threw himself into the jungle with greater determination until he entered the town, and it was worse because his nightmare had begun to come true.